Spare Over Heir
by Kaiorven
Summary: In which Izuna sacrifices his brother over his clan, and the path to victory is one shrouded in deceit.


This has probably been jossed 76 ways since I wrote this two years ago, and 38 more since I actually read the original, what with the Naruto manga being what it is. I wanted to get it from the doldrums of my laptop though so there you go.

A what-if one shot written on a prior version of canon.

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The story of the founding of Konoha is a familiar one, to all but the youngest children. Hashirama and Madara, the alliance of enemies which would forge the strongest ninja village the world had ever seen.

Izuna loved his brother, and most of all loved his clan. Uchiha, as a tendency, held not only pride in their ancestry, but were protective of their kin. They were close-knit, suspicious towards outsiders, hostile to those without the red eyes, it was true, but loyalties of blood and clan, were values that had been ingrained into every Uchiha before they could walk.

They were power hungry and warfaring, but the reason the Uchiha had lasted so long in the world was the fact that clan came first. The Mangekyo Sharingan was not a blessing, but a necessary gift to the Uchiha in times of war. Sacrifice for the clan was another value of the Uchiha; and such sacrifices became increasingly common when the Senju were involved.

In another world, Uchiha Izuna had agreed to be a sacrifice; in order to make sure that their clan would not be tamed by the Senju, an Uchiha had to become Hokage. None, not even he, not even Madara, had a chance of becoming more powerful than Hashirama Senju, not unless desperate measures were taken.

All for the clan; as most Uchiha were taught, and the Academy curriculum brushed over, Uchiha Izuna gave his eyes to his brother, and with it, gave away what made him a ninja.

In another world, Uchiha Izuna betrayed his brother. It was true he wanted to live, but with the growing civil unrest in his own clan, as his (beloved) brother dragged his heels in the peace negotiations, and attempted to use his power to force another path through, and his fading power in his own clan, other factors came into play.

Uchiha Izuna, before he could perform the ultimate sacrifice for the Uchiha (which was not giving his life, which was considered the greatest sacrifice amongst the Senju) -giving his eyes- murdered his own brother. Not in battle; he in any battle, fair or not, would have lost against his prodigy of a brother. Instead a tasteless, mild and slow acting, and virtually intraceable poison had been slipped into the field canteen of his brother. A week later, Uchiha Madara was dead.

The week after, it was not Uchiha Madara who came to negotiate whom would receive the position of Hokage, but his mild mannered younger brother. He did not, to Hashirama's surprise, demand the position of leader; but instead bargained for, and got, an Uchiha designated position on the inner Council.

Madara might have been better in a fight, but Izuna was better in the council room, and while Hashirama was hardly a figurehead, Izuna had gained immense political power of his own. It was no coincidence when the Senju were forced to make more and more concessions; no coincidence that without the same clan and blood to-the-death loyalty all Uchiha possessed, the Senju name faded into obscurity; no coincidence that all the female-line descendants of the clan were gradually, carefully, subtly married into the Uchiha, so that when the time came, the Senju was but a name in the founding of the village, and all the descendants of the once-enemy clan had been assimilated and bore eyes of red.

Despite the increased power of the Uchiha, it had taken five Hokages until an Uchiha gained the hat- Uchiha Shisui, in his late twenties, taking the hat from a Namikaze Minato, whom had died during a Sound Invasion when a treacherous Orochimaru had returned and invaded the village he had once been a hero of.

The seventh Hokage was also an Uchiha, coincidentally; a blonde Uchiha, but an Uchiha nevertheless, even if her last name was Namikaze. Naruko Namikaze, daughter of the Fourth Hokage and Mikoto Uchiha, was born into a vastly different world than Naruto Uzumaki had been, a sealing prodigy and perfect kunoichi, compared to an outcast jinchuuriki and flawed shinobi.

The Kyuubi, attained during the Third Shinobi War by Hatake Sakumo, had been sealed into an red-headed Uzumaki-Uchiha Sasuke, whom was known less for his Sharingan, but far more for his chakra-wielding abilities and massive chakra capacity inherited from his mother, and a scowl his father, Fugaku would have been proud of.

Uchiha Izuna had not defeated the Senju through battle, but in the political arena, through backdoor deals, arranged marriages and carefully constructed alliances. He died, hoping that Madara would forgive him if his brother were to see what he had achieved. After all, in all but the dustiest of family trees, the Senju were gone.

Hashirama and Tobirama would have laughed if they had heard his thoughts.

It was true that the Senju name was gone; but what Izuna had failed to perceive about his rival clan was that their strength was not their tight loyalty to clan and fire and blood, but their openness and their Will of Fire philosophy, which had permeated even through the Uchiha, and had glued Konoha together like nothing else ever would.

The Senju had not faded away. They had dissolved, it was true, but they could be found everywhere, anywhere you turned to look, from the wood of the village to the Hokage Tower, to the teachings of the Academy and in the faces of civilian and clan children alike.

It was true that the most powerful force in Konoha was Uchiha. But the truth was, Konoha was Senju from its leaf genin, and clan branches to its Senju grown roots. It was in a tentative alliance borne of grudging weariness; in the backrooms of the Council; and finally, an a canteen and field rations seeded with betrayal, that the two legacies of the Rikudo Sennin had finally found a semblance of peace.


End file.
